At Death's Door
by Chesscakecheese
Summary: Nano is depressed after the events of the fire which destroyed the majority of her buildings and of the loss and murder of her dear pet, Billy. How will she react, therefore, when she sees the murderer standing over another penguin, this time the one Lalna brought back for her? Yogscast characters Nano/Lalna - 1/1 chapters, fluff/sad I guess; review and favourite if you enjoy!


Nano poked at her noodles slowly as she stirred the liquid around, losing herself in the swirling contents. Something she had loved, Billy, was gone. Yes, Lalna had tried to cheer her up and had made her laugh with those idiotic doors and had even presented her with a new Billy. However, she kept shrinking back into herself, where Mother whispered... But even the voices in her head were seemingly silent, simply allowing her time to grieve for whatever reason. She'd be worried if she could actually bother to care about herself.

"Nano! You've got to see this!" Lalna's voice came through quietly yet tinged with laughter on the comms as Nano sighed, already resigned to the amount of enthusiasm that Lalna would express over something so trivial. Tiddles was gone too, probably dead. Why didn't he care...? Then again, why did she? Oh yeah, she didn't. Apparently.

"Coming... Where are you?" Nano asked depressingly as she picked herself up and walked out of the remains of her Noodle Hut. There was little more to say about how upsetting it was to eat noodles when half the room was blown up around you; as soon as she was ready, she'd fix it. She had to. Later.

"Botania Hut!" Lalna replied as Nano walked over slowly, allowing a small smile to come to her face at the truly awful doors Lalna had put up. Soon she would have revenge and put Lalnables evil, manic face on there instead. Thinking this she opened the door and almost forgot to breathe when she saw the sight in front of her. She suddenly felt cold as she felt all the warmth drain out of her.

A blonde figure wearing a lab coat was looking down in his arms, his blonde hair over his face as he looked down at the motionless penguin with some sort of red dye over it's chest. The figure also had large amounts of red staining on his lab coat, and didn't look up when Nano walked into the room. He was seemingly muttering words to the dead penguin. He was wearing goggles. It was him.

Nano took one look at the situation in front of her and instantly screamed in rage, drawing her sword and charging widely at the man in front of her. The figure looked up in surprise and alarm as the penguin suddenly awoke, giving a small cry of it's own as it hopped out of the mans arms and waddled away, terrified. Nano faltered at this, stumbling and tripping into the man in front of her, who was looking at her in fear. They both fell against the newly constructed wall, Nano automatically pinning Lalnable in front of her as he cried out as the sword made contact.

"I'm going to kill you, you murderer!" Nano hissed venomously, looking at the man in front of her with fire in her eyes. Her sword had already lodged itself in his shoulder, although she had been aiming for his heart.

"Nano... It's me..." Nano looked in confusion at the man staring up at her, with a mixture of emotions across his face. Hurt, confusion, fear... Betrayal. Nano looked at him carefully, confused.

"But... The blood..." She questioned, glancing down at Lalna's coat and realising that the red was caused by something far more powder like, rather than liquid.

Lalna laughed weakly. "Redstone..." He breathed heavily as he closed his eyes, grinding his teeth together in pain. Nano wanted to cry but forced herself to check. She hadn't just stabbed her friend. She couldn't have.

"The penguin wasn't moving..." She tried to reason, not knowing why she so desperately wanted the man in front of her, whose sword was through his shoulder, to be the man whom she wanted to kill.

"Billy2 was asleep... I got redstone on his wings though and thought it was funny... Thought you'd laugh..." Lalna said, chuckling slightly before crying out in pain as Nano immediately moved off him, suddenly removing her sword from his shoulder as she began to panic.

"Llana, I am so sorry, I just assumed..." Nano began shakily before attempting to calm herself down, "... I have a golden apple, it'll make you better!" Nano reached into her bag and offered the apple to Lalna. When he made no response other then looking at her weakly, she leant back over him and held it to his mouth.

"Open...?" Nano asked, too ashamed with herself to make it an order as Lalna took the smallest of bites before pulling a face.

"Sorry Nano, but... Not going to work." Lalna smiled up at her sadly as Nano frowned.

"What do you mean? It's a golden apple, it always heals you." Nano asked in confusion as Lalna shook his head slowly.

"Whilst you were upset, I put something extra on your blade... As a defence... In case he tried to come back... Golden apples won't work, nothing will..." Lalna trailed off as he closed his eyes, Nano desperately shaking him until he opened them again.

"What, so you're... Dying? Is that what you're saying? You're joking, right? Lalna... I will kill you if you die, you can't leave me now!" Nano said shakily, unable to stop the tears rolling down her eyes as Lalna gave a light smile to her paradox.

Llana leant into Nano's arms as he sighed heavily. "I'm not leaving just yet... I have a question to ask though, if you don't mind..." Lalna's voice trailed off and Nano struggled to sit him up, leaning him against her as she slapped his face, causing him to blink slowly.

"Yes...?" Nano whispered as Lalna looked into her captivating brown eyes.

"I love you... I think I do anyway. You're the most important thing in the world to me, more than science or stupid doors... so I must love you, right?" Lalna closed his eyes as he felt his chest start to burn; whether from the poison or the confession he didn't know... He didn't have much longer now. He had designed the poison to be slow but effective... And painful. He almost didn't realise Nano's face was next to his until she whispered her answer, he breath lightly tickling the side of his face.

"I guess you must..." Nano breathed, pressing her forehead against Lalna's, ignoring the raging temperature he had and convincing herself it was fine. Everything was fine. Everything had to be fine.

"... That's good to know. It's alright if you don't love me... I just wanted to know..." Lalna's voice trailed off in pain as he lost the movement in his legs. He only had a minute more... Possibly less. He couldn't rest happily knowing he was leaving Nano behind... But he was glad he'd told her.

Nano looked at her teacher, her friend, dying in front of her and asked herself a question she had never asked herself before. Did she love him? Maybe... Just maybe... Even though he was dying...

"... I love you too Lalna..." Nano felt the tears roll down from her eyes in a constant stream, splashing onto the face below her as Lalna smiled with his eyes closed.

"Well, that's just bad timing." He joked before his breath caught in his throat as he failed to breathe. Nano looked at him in terror as he started choking, pushing her away as she tried to help.

"N...no... I'm...so...sorr...ry..." Lalna choked, collapsing against her as she screamed words he couldn't hear at him. He could feel himself falling into darkness, not being able to breathe... This was his end.

Nano watched the motionless body of the person she cared about the most in all the worlds she had been on, choking on sobs as she felt totally alone. A small pressure next to her suddenly made her stop as she looked under her left arm to see that the penguin was nudging her arm up. She automatically lifted it as the penguin snuggled down next to her, looking up at her with round, innocent eyes as it peeped quietly. Nano immediately brought the penguin close to her as she held it, stroking it's feathers and ignoring the way her purple hands were died slightly red at the redstone on them from the feathers. She looked over at Lalna's corpse and leant in close to his face.

"Goodbye..." She whispered as she brushed her lips against his before resting her head on his shoulder, trying to suppress more tears.

"... Oh hell."

Nano's eyes flew open in shock as she shot backwards with the penguin in her arms as Lalna slowly got to his feet, wincing.

"What the hell happened Nano?!" Lalna demanded as he looked at her, wincing as he moved his shoulder. He looked at his shoulder, partially healed due to the golden apple, and his mouth dropped open.

"Why am I hurt?" He demanded as he spun around to look at Nano, who was clutching the penguin to her as if it was a lifeline. He frowned when he noticed her bloodied sword beside her.

"... Did you stab me?" He asked slowly as Nano nodded mutely. Lalna ran a hand through his hair, troubled.

"Then I'm meant to be dead. Huh. Maybe the sugar cancelled out the spiders eye and the metallic properties..." He mused as he looked at Nano, smiling happily as she stared at him blankly.

"I'm not dead!" He cried out happily, doing a small dance around the room as Nano continued to stare at him in shock.

"You're not dead..." She repeated dumbly as Lalna stopped dancing, laughing.

"Oh god, did you watch me die? Was it bad? I see you've warmed up to Billy2!" Lalna pointed out as Nano put the penguin down carefully.

"Do you remember anything that happened?" Nano asked cautiously as Lalna shook his head.

"Nope, not even you stabbing me. Weird, right? I didn't say anything embarrassing did I?" He asked lightly as he dragged her outside, Nano letting herself be pulled along as she continued to be confused.

"No, not at all..." Nano said weakly as they entered the building, Lalna immediately taking something from the computer.

"Right, drink this!" He said firmly as he held a vial of liquid towards her. Nano took it, frowning.

"This does...?" She asked as she sniffed it hesitantly.

"Relaxes you - you look like you've seen a ghost and watching me die must have been awful. It helps you to let go of those memories..." Lalna said calmly as Nano drank the liquid. Within a few moments her buddy slumped towards the ground as Llana caught her, carrying her bridal style to her bedroom and laying her down on her bed.

"... It was all just a bad dream Nano. I promise..." Llana said softly as he made a quick exit to clean up all the evidence, cleaning the redstone from the room, his coat and the penguin before cleaning Nano's sword. He thought for a moment before heading to the furnace and removing the properties of the poison from her blade, munching a golden apple to heal himself as he did so. It was safer that way. He had planted the sword by Nano's bed and had just headed to the main building before the comms crackled to life.

"... Lalna? Lalna, are you there?" Nano's voice came through anxiously.

"Yup, you alright? You crashed out..." Lalna smiled as he heard the evident sigh of relief from Nano.

"Thank god... It was just a dream..." She mumbled as Lalna looked at himself in the reflection of the monitor for the computer, hesitantly raising a hand to his lips before nodding determinedly to himself. She didn't need to know anything of what had just happened. At least, not yet.

"Just a dream..." He echoed as he started on yet another door in an attempt to make the woman he loved smile.

 **AN: Leave a comment and a favourite if you like these short stories, or want more of them! :)**


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